Starting life as a DOS game back in 1987, The Great Giana Sisters (sometimes refered to as just “Giana Sisters”), developed by Time Warp Productions and published by Rainbow Arts, was essentially PC gamers’ answer to Nintendo’s Super Mario Bros. You collected diamonds instead of coins, jumped on enemies, the controls felt the same, early stages bore a very strong resemblance to early Mario stages, and if you collected a certain red ball of fire, you went from cute Giana to punk Giana, who could shoot fireballs and break blocks with her head. The game quickly gained popularity, due to its fun gameplay and memorable music, but the similarities were uncanny, and thus the game got Nintendo’s attention and was pulled.
Flash forward to 2009, where the game was pulled out of hypernation, by then IP owner Spellbound Interactive, who released Giana Sisters DS on the Nintendo DS, with a graphical overhaul, greatly expanded game length, and featuring the original 32 stages as an unlockable.
Giana Sisters was peeking out of the closet, and in July 2012 it would finally get back on the map, when Black Forest Games (yes, the same people who recently released Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back… no wait!! Come back!!), announced a kickstarter titled Project Giana. Later retitled Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams, the project was successfully funded with a budget of $186,158, little over their goal of $150,000, but funded nonetheless. Already in October of the same year, the game would be released on PC, featuring iconic music from original composer Chris Hülsbeck, as well as Swedish “SID metal” band Machinae Supremacy, and would later see release on Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network as well.
On Steam the game would see DLC in the form of Rise of the Owlverlord, and set DLC would come with the game, when the good folks at SOEDESCO released Giana Sisters: Director’s Cut on the PS4 in 2015.
Which brings us to today, the year of the lord 2018, where Black Forest Games recently announced that all of the Giana Sisters goodness you can possibly stomach, will be hitting the Nintendo Switch on September 25th, in the form of Giana Sisters: Owltimate Edition!
So are you excited to pick this one up when it launches? Did you pick it up when it first released in 2012? Maybe you were even one of the backers for the kickstarters? Or does your acquaintance with the beloved sisters go back way further than that? Please let us know, and be sure to stay tuned to our upcoming review!
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